Housing Demand and Affordability in India : Implications for Housing Policy

The focus of this paper is on the demand for housing in urban India. Using rental data, the paper finds that income elasticities of housing demand are high and elastic across time. Hedonic pricing regressions confirm that this high elasticity is dr...

Full description

Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Karmali, Nadeem M., Weng, Xinyu
Format: Working Paper
Language:English
Published: World Bank, Washington, DC 2022
Subjects:
Online Access:http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/099342105022229388/IDU0ba4ed93c0c44a0485c09c6b046aabdec42dc
http://hdl.handle.net/10986/37402
id okr-10986-37402
recordtype oai_dc
spelling okr-10986-374022022-05-06T05:10:34Z Housing Demand and Affordability in India : Implications for Housing Policy Karmali, Nadeem M. Weng, Xinyu HOUSING DEMAND URBAN HOUSING DEMAND HOUSING DEMAND ESTIMATES HOUSEHOLD SUBSIDIES PUBLIC INVESTMENT IN INFRASTRUCTURE HOUSING COST INTERVENTION RENTAL MARKET DATA PUBLIC INVESTMENT POLICY The focus of this paper is on the demand for housing in urban India. Using rental data, the paper finds that income elasticities of housing demand are high and elastic across time. Hedonic pricing regressions confirm that this high elasticity is driven by high demand for improved water and sanitation amenities that are attached to the consumption of housing. Further, the demand estimations show that rental markets in urban India and in megacities are becoming more efficient, emerging from the shadow of legacy rent control regulation and uncertainty from the past. All the results suggest that household subsidies or other demand-side interventions are less warranted, but rather investments to increase housing supply through better service infrastructure for water, sanitation, and connectivity are better uses of public resources. The analysis also provides guidelines to improve the targeting of housing programs by means testing against the income distribution. Using one such estimate of the income distribution, the paper shows that housing affordability is improving in India. In doing so, the paper highlights the methodological challenges in measuring housing affordability in developing countries. 2022-05-05T20:48:05Z 2022-05-05T20:48:05Z 2022-05 Working Paper http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/099342105022229388/IDU0ba4ed93c0c44a0485c09c6b046aabdec42dc http://hdl.handle.net/10986/37402 English Policy Research Working Paper;10031 CC BY 3.0 IGO http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/igo World Bank World Bank, Washington, DC Policy Research Working Paper Publications & Research India
repository_type Digital Repository
institution_category Foreign Institution
institution Digital Repositories
building World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection World Bank
language English
topic HOUSING DEMAND
URBAN HOUSING DEMAND
HOUSING DEMAND ESTIMATES
HOUSEHOLD SUBSIDIES
PUBLIC INVESTMENT IN INFRASTRUCTURE
HOUSING COST INTERVENTION
RENTAL MARKET DATA
PUBLIC INVESTMENT POLICY
spellingShingle HOUSING DEMAND
URBAN HOUSING DEMAND
HOUSING DEMAND ESTIMATES
HOUSEHOLD SUBSIDIES
PUBLIC INVESTMENT IN INFRASTRUCTURE
HOUSING COST INTERVENTION
RENTAL MARKET DATA
PUBLIC INVESTMENT POLICY
Karmali, Nadeem M.
Weng, Xinyu
Housing Demand and Affordability in India : Implications for Housing Policy
geographic_facet India
relation Policy Research Working Paper;10031
description The focus of this paper is on the demand for housing in urban India. Using rental data, the paper finds that income elasticities of housing demand are high and elastic across time. Hedonic pricing regressions confirm that this high elasticity is driven by high demand for improved water and sanitation amenities that are attached to the consumption of housing. Further, the demand estimations show that rental markets in urban India and in megacities are becoming more efficient, emerging from the shadow of legacy rent control regulation and uncertainty from the past. All the results suggest that household subsidies or other demand-side interventions are less warranted, but rather investments to increase housing supply through better service infrastructure for water, sanitation, and connectivity are better uses of public resources. The analysis also provides guidelines to improve the targeting of housing programs by means testing against the income distribution. Using one such estimate of the income distribution, the paper shows that housing affordability is improving in India. In doing so, the paper highlights the methodological challenges in measuring housing affordability in developing countries.
format Working Paper
author Karmali, Nadeem M.
Weng, Xinyu
author_facet Karmali, Nadeem M.
Weng, Xinyu
author_sort Karmali, Nadeem M.
title Housing Demand and Affordability in India : Implications for Housing Policy
title_short Housing Demand and Affordability in India : Implications for Housing Policy
title_full Housing Demand and Affordability in India : Implications for Housing Policy
title_fullStr Housing Demand and Affordability in India : Implications for Housing Policy
title_full_unstemmed Housing Demand and Affordability in India : Implications for Housing Policy
title_sort housing demand and affordability in india : implications for housing policy
publisher World Bank, Washington, DC
publishDate 2022
url http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/099342105022229388/IDU0ba4ed93c0c44a0485c09c6b046aabdec42dc
http://hdl.handle.net/10986/37402
_version_ 1764487106074247168